Ping Pong

Ping Pong is one of those sports that's good even when it's bad. I met up with Guanchen and Shuoyou for some quasi-sports action in the basement of one of the buildings near the back gate of HIT. Guanchen treated us: 2RMB (13p) for two hours fun!

Having not played in years (and being rubbish even then) and facing some determined Asian opposition, I got thrashed by Guanchen in the warmup, before facing some random Chinese guy we'd just met ... and losing 5 games to 0.

Next Shuoyou stepped up. Despite desperately trying to let me win by floating all his returns to a nice smashable height, he crushed me 4 to 1.

For our last game before dinner, Guanchen paired up with a girl from a neighbouring table, and I partnered with Shuoyou for some doubles action. Twenty minutes of frantic sliding around on the dangerously well-buffed floor later and the Doun-Shuoyou duo had triumphed against the Chinese pair 2 games to 1! A massive reversal of the usual Ping Pong World Order.

To celebrate, we went to a pancake restaurant for dinner. Smoked pork, a vegetable stir-fry, some sort of omelette and spring onion, slathered in plum sauce and wrapped up in one of two types of pancake. Then the whole thing washed down with big bowls of savoury porridge, or if the porridge is rubbish, fresh Harbin Beer. Happy times!